SPEAKER_06 0:04

Babies just be jaunded sometimes, bro. Seasons greetings and salutations and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. Come on in and stay a while. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are horror movie review podcasts dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack, a total joke, a waste of time, or a slash.

SPEAKER_02 0:28

Totally killer. Unintended.

SPEAKER_06 0:30

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with a perspective we've all gained from our varying walks of life, as varied as they may be, and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris, I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast. Joining me this winter evening is the Superfly Space Guy Mac.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Happy Christmas.

SPEAKER_06 0:48

The gore lover Alexis. Hey Rewind. The cowardly creeper Ryan. Ho ho haya. And the Scream Queen Paris.

SPEAKER_03 0:56

Santa Claus is dead.

SPEAKER_06 0:58

This week we're taking a look at the remake of a classic Christmas slasher. But before we get to those festivities and breakout Santa's cookies, we have some follow-up.

SPEAKER_03 1:06

So we recently reviewed a movie called Saw 3, and if you remember, our friend Jordan joined us for that episode with all of their lovely insight into the franchise. But you know, we wanted to hear from more than just Jordan, so we asked our friends on social media what they thought. This, to me, feels right. Uh, 33% of our friends gave it a hack, and 76% gave it a slash.

SPEAKER_06 1:28

Friends right for social media.

SPEAKER_03 1:29

Now we have a couple comments from our friends, including Spencer, who said, for some reason, Saw 3 holds a special place in my heart. It was the only one I was able to see in theaters, and I think the traps are some of their best.

SPEAKER_04 1:40

Love it, Spencer.

SPEAKER_03 1:41

And then on the contrary, we have Rob who said, Honestly, I'm not a fan of the franchise. I thought the first two were okay, but didn't like anything after that. I think it was Chris who pointed out that three went away from the central idea of the first two, and I think that was a bad choice. And I feel like that is a pretty fair critique of the third one.

SPEAKER_07 1:58

My man, I feel like Saw is one of those things where you are so far into it or just so far out of it. You rather be in it. To be fair, I'd rather not be in it, honestly.

SPEAKER_06 2:10

Do you guys remember that sequel to Aladdin where it's like the Prince of Thieves and it has his father, and he's like, Are you in or out?

SPEAKER_03 2:17

Yes, I do.

SPEAKER_06 2:18

This is that franchise.

SPEAKER_03 2:19

There's a sequel to Aladdin?

SPEAKER_06 2:21

Yeah, there's many. I've never seen Aladdin. Yeah, there's also Lion King one, two, one and a half. I have seen Lion King, but Aladdin.

SPEAKER_04 2:29

I got the gist. There's more of a beauty and the beast kind of sequel, girl.

SPEAKER_06 2:33

Oh, yeah. There's sequels to that too. Yeah. So we'll do uh side podcast, all the unknown uh shitty sequels to Disney movies.

SPEAKER_03 2:39

Like Little Mermaid 2, where you find out that Ursula had a skinny, hotter sister.

SPEAKER_06 2:44

Oh yes, yes.

SPEAKER_03 2:46

Named Morgana, no less. Oh. Anyway, that's our follow-up.

SPEAKER_06 2:50

Alright, well, on to more horror-related things. Over on Patreon, we released an episode of The Rewind where just about everyone here besides Ryan and I experienced the 1974 classic Black Christmas for the very first time. I won't spoil the fun for that episode, but I will say this. It's available for all of our patrons, including that $1 tier, and a common desire from everyone but me was to have a better understanding of the killer's backstory. Well, you asked for it, you brought it upon yourself, so here we have it, braced for backstory. This week we're talking about the 2006 remake of Black Christmas. Except this time it's spelled Xmas because it's edgy. Who has seen this before?

SPEAKER_03 3:28

You know, Chris, I too was very edgy in 2006, and I actually saw this movie in theaters, mostly because Michelle Trachtenberg was in it.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Oh so edgy.

SPEAKER_02 3:38

So maybe I don't edge as often as you do, but this is my first time seeing this film, and I just heard you guys talk about it, but that's about it.

SPEAKER_04 3:44

Yeah, the poster for this movie looks very familiar. I have seen um the 1974 version for the we rewind, but um other than that, I'm not really familiar with this franchise at all.

SPEAKER_07 3:57

Yeah, so I was uh in sixth grade in 2006, so I definitely didn't see this in theaters. I'm not even that young, but you guys make me feel so young. I hadn't seen this. I of course had already seen the previous and the newer one. Um so this one was the one in the middle, and uh it was like a middle stepchild, you could say.

SPEAKER_06 4:16

This one that I did also see in theaters when it came out. My family and I felt a lot of anticipation for it. So the original Black Christmas is one of my all-time favorite films, and it's a favorite in my family. Now, before this, there was radio silence on this franchise, right? It wasn't even a franchise yet, it was just a singular movie. It was a movie that was like growing in cult popularity because it aged so well as a slasher, and everyone's like, oh shit, this one thing started it all. Now, keep in mind that there was never another movie starring Billy before this. There was no comeback for Jess. The idea of finally getting to experience this again was, in some ways, even more thrilling to me than when I found out they were remaking Halloween in 2007, because I had already gotten years of fixes with a lot of Michael Myers movies. So this remake was an opportunity to put a classic film back on the map and make it relevant to a modern audience. But for those of you who hadn't seen this before, what were you expecting going into it?

SPEAKER_07 5:10

You know, I gotta be honest here. If you've listened to this podcast for a long time, you're expecting the same thing as me, which is to hate this movie because of Chris. Because all you've ever heard Chris do is trash the 2006 version of Black Christmas, which means Paris will probably like it.

SPEAKER_06 5:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:26

Well, wait, listen, Chris, if you recall, this movie actually has a special place in my heart only for the fact that it's one of the first things that brought you and I together. Oh I remember I walked into the break room one day, I saw your horror is for everyone sticker, and I said, Oh, you like horror movies? We started talking and then we bonded over how we both remember this movie being very shitty.

SPEAKER_06 5:46

Oh, wow. Yeah, that is a very fond memory. How delightful. Thanks for bringing that back. It's I feel like I can't even remember working with you in a physical space.

SPEAKER_03 5:54

Yeah. It was so long ago.

SPEAKER_04 5:56

Yes. I was um expecting this to have that, you know, as Chris would say, edginess um to the original, because I had seen that for the rewind um recently. And I was expecting to have this, you know, Texas Chainsaw, these all these other remakes that came out in the early 2000s, which I honestly was kind of a fan of. But yeah, so I just thought it would have this like updated version of this movie.

SPEAKER_07 6:20

Yeah, there's a certain genese qua about remakes from the 2000s, right?

SPEAKER_05 6:24

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 6:24

There.

SPEAKER_07 6:25

Whether that be good or bad.

SPEAKER_02 6:26

Yeah, I mean, 2000s, I'm thinking like soap opera, storylines, grittiness, a lot more gore, and then some classic like WB slash CW actors.

SPEAKER_03 6:37

I was just thinking CW actors, and you said it, Mac.

SPEAKER_06 6:40

Hey, don't get down on CW. CW has some great shit.

SPEAKER_03 6:43

But that's like the vibe of a 2000s remake.

SPEAKER_06 6:46

That's true. Okay, so lofty expectations, or maybe the bar was extremely low, but how did you all feel while you were watching it?

SPEAKER_04 6:53

I like to say I felt very surprised at how fast this started and how quickly it turned on and how it stayed and had the same momentum throughout this entire movie. To me, there were no lulls. Um, so I kind of was anxious the entire time. I was waiting for, you know, there's like some sort of like climactic part towards the end, but there it was just like that to me consistently. And I think it was because of the um, we'll talk about it later, but like the deaths. Um they were just like sprinkled throughout, like a perfect little um cookie with sprinkles on it. Just to clarify, you had climax the entire time. If you know me, yes, I did. Uh that's why I said I was surprised.

SPEAKER_07 7:34

You know, I I don't really know what I felt during this. I I know it sounds dumb, but there is a lot going on, and you kind of have it right, like it's like a car. You start the car and then it just keeps going. There it really doesn't slow down at all in this movie. And um I I felt overwhelmed at points. I think that's the best way I could say it.

SPEAKER_03 7:57

I feel like that's totally fair, Ryan, because when I was watching this movie, I felt like it was a lot, you know, especially compared to having just recently watched the original. I was like, yeah, this this cranked it up to a billion uh in ways that I don't know anyone asked for. We definitely get backstory, which I did ask for.

SPEAKER_04 8:16

Um it was everything you asked for, yeah, honestly, and the first one, it really was.

SPEAKER_03 8:23

Um, but yeah, I I felt like even though I had seen this, I hadn't seen this since 2006. So I have very specific memories of it. Um, and those moments definitely happened, but then there were other things that I didn't remember at all, and I was like, What? Why?

SPEAKER_06 8:40

Same interesting. It's also interesting that you say you're overwhelmed, Ryan. And Paris, it sounds like to it to a degree that you agree. I was actually underwhelmed, and I was underwhelmed by what they thought would be tense and frightening. Uh, I was unimpressed by the performances, and I was unsatisfied by these like little scraps of moments where they try to pay reverence to the original. And no, you know, no, not even fair, not even gonna say reverence. Uh, I can't say it because it comes across as so crass. It feels more like Black Christmas sacrilege.

SPEAKER_02 9:11

Oh. There it is. I'm I'm gonna jump on that boat with you, and you know, maybe I I think we deserve a bigger boat and more people on it, but there was just a lot of fluff. I honestly was waiting to find out that this had been made for 3D because there was just so many jump scares, like so many jump scares. And I mean, I know we, you know, we talked about the original film recently. Um, we alluded to this film, you know, having more details, like you've mentioned, Paris. So, I mean, I was I was expecting that. I was just kind of surprised and honestly disappointed by the story that we were given. You know, more details, yes, but the details we got were kind of lackluster.

SPEAKER_07 9:48

Yeah, I have to agree. And um, to kind of build on what Chris was saying, like my surprises here were how many of the same things were used throughout this movie, like the number of eyeballs that you see in this movie after, and it feels like, oh my god, there's a really iconic eyeball in the first movie. We gotta use eyeballs, man. We gotta we gotta get some eyeballs in there. And like there's a there's a unicorn figurine, like how many unicorns can we get in this movie? And it's just like, all right, guys, like we get it. Someone has an eyeball. We understand there's a unicorn, we get it. But it I think like the the biggest surprise was the way they tried to call back to the original for me, and that's a disappointing surprise, not a happy one.

SPEAKER_04 10:34

That was just a nice surprise to me. I mean, it was an exponential growth of everything I wanted in the first movie, like gore. I got that times a million. Um, I got a backstory times a million.

SPEAKER_06 10:46

If anyone's gonna be happy with this movie, it's gonna be the chick who loves all the gore. You could do like a supercut of just the gore. That would probably make a lot of sense as its own movie.

SPEAKER_04 10:57

Oh, yeah. It really would. It would just be its own like little uh mini, mini uh mini movie, little exploit film. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, more like that, I think, than a mini movie.

SPEAKER_02 11:06

It's kind of like the first movie was like a decently balanced ham sandwich with a little bit of cheese lightly brushed with mayo on the bread. And then, you know, this time they were just like, here's four pounds of ham. Enjoy. No bread, no mayo, no cheese, eat four pounds of ham.

SPEAKER_06 11:23

And I fucking hate ham. You said you'd like to see.

SPEAKER_02 11:26

Yeah, you know, you want if like cold cuts are great and you want like a piece or two because you're snacking, and that's fine. But I didn't ask you to feed me four pounds of ham.

SPEAKER_04 11:33

That's what you just thought I gave you, though. Wow. Four pounds. It was literally two slices.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

I saw I I saw cold cuts. Mac, you are a ham. I'm a ham. I I saw cold cuts, and I don't know, I just assumed ham turkey's fine, it's whatever. But if you were to be like, here, here's a whole like bag of it, I need you to eat that entire bag. I would have been like, please stop.

SPEAKER_04 11:51

Yeah, there's this restaurant here, it's like Route 66 or something like that. And those they're the corned beef sandwiches, they're just like too much for me.

SPEAKER_06 11:58

But I have a small mouth and I can't eat anything that like I can't get my jaw to like unhinge for. You know what I mean? Like if it's like of a certain height, then I can't do it. I was gonna say mine unhinges, but uh I do have a small mouth. Uh I got like TMJ, my jaw will like lock open and it's weird.

SPEAKER_03 12:15

Yeah, mile high sandwiches, man. That's that's too much. I don't know why, Chris, but you just said small mouth and it just reminded me of the uh leech woman from Puppet Master.

SPEAKER_06 12:23

That's fair. That's an apt comparison.

SPEAKER_03 12:25

Uh so as far as surprises go, uh, if you are one of our patrons and you've listened to the rewind episode for the original Black Christmas, you may recall me uh talking about Andrea Martin. Um, and I have a funny story. When we were talking about Andrea Martin, I didn't realize it was Andrea Martin, uh comedic genius, uh famous Jewish mom, despite the fact that she's actually just Armenian. So when I saw this, and I remember Chris was like, oh yeah, she comes back in the in the 2006 version to play the house mother. And I was like, okay, I don't remember that. I don't know who Andrea Martin is. Uh and I saw her and I was like, oh, that Andrea Martin. So that was a huge surprise to me. I actually texted Chris in the moment and was like, hey, want to hear how dumb of a bitch I am?

SPEAKER_04 13:06

She's also the Anne in my big fat Greek wedding. And I'm not sure. Oh, she's in everything. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:10

She has a huge career.

SPEAKER_06 13:12

Yeah. She is a classic mom. This movie left such a strong impression on me that uh I can't say there's much of anything that's surprising. But I do have some disappointments. And I think it's like when you love something as intensely as you love the original Black Christmas, it is natural to have these disappointments. Uh one of our patrons, Spencer, and I were messaging back and forth about the movies uh pretty recently, all of them in the franchise. And I think where where it comes down to for me is like this movie doesn't have its own strong identity. It's too all over the place. In some places, it wants to be a gritty, brutal, modern reimagining of the original. And then it points out these small moments because it can't be that original. It points out these small moments for of for fans of the original, but then it completely mishandles the moment. The biggest disappointment I have is the total lack of regard for how the women in this movie are handled, the element of the original that was undoubtedly one of its strongest points. In our rewind episode for the original, we all talked in some shape or form about how great the characters were, you know, some more than others. In this one, we get characters who speak backstories for relationships and other characters. Like they literally just talk it. They talk about the history. You don't feel it, you don't pick up on it with nuance. And that style of writing is combined with like this overwhelming majority of lackluster performances, which actually know what that did surprise me because I like every single actress in this movie. I've seen them in other things. I like them a lot. The pieces of the puzzle are there, despite having enjoyed all the work that they've done, they weren't pushed here. Or actually, they were pushed in a terrible direction, and they had unimpressive material to work with, and that's what hurts.

SPEAKER_07 14:47

And you know, Chris, that's really the scariest part of this movie, you know. There's really not much else. I think you get a lot of gore here, but not any of it scared me, and a lot of jump scares, and none of them worked on me. I don't know how you guys feel.

SPEAKER_04 15:04

Um, yeah, it wasn't like too terribly like, oh, I need to go like make sure all my lights are on. But one of the characters, their hair is pretty tangly in this movie. And oh my god, it's giving me vibes pre-cutting my hair the other day because I was like, I ain't having these ends after I watched this movie, and I'm pretty sure that's why I cut my hair. Hence why it's in a bun right now. It's bad. I cut it myself. I feel like this is the wrong kind of fear, though.

SPEAKER_02 15:31

Yeah, I had the wrong kind of fear. I was honestly scared for the filmmakers. Did their careers survive this film?

SPEAKER_06 15:38

The director, no.

SPEAKER_02 15:39

Yeah, I'm I'm not surprised because it wasn't really scary. And uh, you know, like Ryan said, the only things that are scary are like thinking about the film. Not what happens in the film, but just like thinking about it as a film that might be scary.

SPEAKER_06 15:53

The director for this movie, Glenn Morgan, he was a friend of Bob Clark's, loved the original Black Christmas. So he wanted to work with Bob Clark, and they wanted to basically take the idea that Bob Clark had for the killer in the backstory and explore that more in a modern movie. This, however, is a movie that uh suffered from studio interference. And the only thing that's frightening about this movie is the disgusting power the Weinstein brothers had to ruin the remake. This movie isn't just it's it's just not scary. It's gross, it's grimy, but any amount of tension this movie tries to build is spoiled and ruined by its own editing. There are moments where an item is put down and the camera lingers to show you. Oh, uh-uh, uh, pay attention. This might not be here in a moment. Or in other cases, ah, you see, this totally innocent location where it'd be bonkers if someone poked out right now. Yeah, let's let's look at it together, because it's gonna happen. Let's linger in this moment, shall we? And it's fucking infuriating. Now, over on our Patreon for bonus content to celebrate this franchise, I actually put together a video that breaks down each of the movies in the franchise and looks at the production of them, the time they were made, and looks at how each entry in the franchise shaped it as a whole. So if you want to hear more about that studio interference, if you want to learn more about the goals this movie had before it was ruined by the Weinstein brothers, definitely check that out.

SPEAKER_03 17:19

I'm mad now that I know that this was Weinstein related.

SPEAKER_06 17:22

Yeah. I do be like that sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 17:24

Yeah. I mean, while watching it, Chris, you have the you have those moments and they're just so overt and so obvious that it's like painful. Like we we I've joked in the past about characters. We we talk about like mentioning the name of a movie inside of it, and while it didn't happen necessarily, it might as well have happened in this film.

SPEAKER_00 17:43

I feel like every character had those moments where there would be they would be like, wouldn't it be bad if someone were to get murdered on this black Christmas?

SPEAKER_07 17:52

Yeah, I mean they basically spent the whole movie saying, but Billy.

SPEAKER_02 17:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 17:56

Well, I don't have to use your same accent. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 17:59

Yeah, that's all all of them.

SPEAKER_07 18:00

Why you do this to me, Billy? Like, didn't you guys see that movie about this house before? Did you see the one?

SPEAKER_00 18:06

Absolutely, reference for a second. Who has the gift for Billy the murderer?

SPEAKER_06 18:13

I know all this backstory, but now that there's a strange townie up in here, I'm gonna ask you what happened because I've suddenly lost all knowledge of the events.

SPEAKER_02 18:22

Painful moments.

SPEAKER_06 18:24

Absolutely. And uh the the frustrating thing is that although there are little nuggets in this movie that you can see were well intended and may have been successful had they been executed properly, this movie doesn't even stand up in terms of originality for me because all the elements come together in a package where that's poorly directed, poorly written, poorly performed, and it feels like another generic 2000 slasher. And it's like you you have these moments that are so iconic, these quotes that are so iconic from the original, and they fall flat here. And nothing of this feels like it has a soul. That's deep.

SPEAKER_04 19:06

I mean, I get where you're coming from. It has like all these things that aren't original, but to me, like I don't know, and it and it does seem like a 2000 slasher. I even said that previously, but I don't know. I think to me it's like that this really weird, like topsy turvy kind of feeling um that I think is kind of original. Also, I don't think I've seen a movie like this where they're like starting off the movie by a kill and like literally like throughout the entire movie, like you know, just carrying on that.

SPEAKER_07 19:37

I struggle with this one. I honestly don't have any idea if it's is original or not. It it doesn't feel original, but I think my feelings about the movie overall influence that. So I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 19:48

Yeah, I think it goes back to what Chris said is that it feels like other movies of the of the same decade in which it was released. It feels like all of them kind of rolled up into one. So honestly, I was kind of expecting that. Like I I'm not gonna hide and say, like, oh, I was thinking maybe it'll be good because the source material was good. I was going in seeing 2006 and thinking it's gonna feel like another 2006 movie or a 2008 movie or a 2009 movie. It's all gonna be kind of around the same feeling, and uh it is, it it doesn't feel original. You know, the first time you have uh hard liquor probably feels pretty original, but um when you drink enough to puke, it's you don't appreciate it.

SPEAKER_03 20:31

What an interesting analogy, Mac. Yeah, this movie wasn't scary. Um it's a remake, but wasn't really original. I think if I'm reaching the choices that they made for the backstory that we get, um ultimately pretty original, some stuff I've never seen before, maybe never want to see again.

SPEAKER_06 20:52

Yeah, and uh the roots of that again come from the original writer of the original film.

SPEAKER_03 20:57

So it doesn't even count.

SPEAKER_06 20:59

Yeah. It's weird.

SPEAKER_03 21:01

And yeah, the ending of this movie is one of the things I remembered most. Uh I remembered one kill very specifically from 2006, and I remembered the ending. I remember being so confused by it. It's something Chris and I bonded about that day in the break room, uh, because the ending of this movie is not good.

SPEAKER_02 21:19

Now, when we talk about ending, are we talking about the end or the end or the end or the end end of the end end? This one has like 12 of Lord of the Rings all over again. I mean, come on. It just drags it on. One more jump scare, how about another? You want another? How about three? How about five? You get another jump scare. You want another one? Here's another jump scare, and maybe there's another jump scare. And nope, the movie's not over yet. Keep waiting for it. And I mean, the mid 2000s, they couldn't let things just be over, could they?

SPEAKER_06 21:45

That's so true.

SPEAKER_02 21:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 21:47

However, I do feel like the ending being what it is, fucking strikes a nail into that coffin, so there's no hope of it coming back. So, you know, the whole movie's handled in such a way, right? I'm not saying anything particular about the Events that I do think if they chose to to continue, there is certainly opportunity for that. But I feel like the overall gist of the ending combined with just the entire way that this movie plays out, it feels like it's not gonna happen again. Like it feels like a one movie production.

SPEAKER_07 22:16

Yeah, I can't say that I enjoyed the ending, any of them, all of them. There are definitely some specific details that stand out to me, and I'm like, yeah, that doesn't uh that doesn't really work for me. It didn't really do it for me. Wow, we're all so positive about this movie. Have you noticed?

SPEAKER_04 22:33

I don't have any feelings towards the end. I think because it just was what it was. Because the whole movie was the end for you.

SPEAKER_06 22:39

It was all climaxing.

SPEAKER_04 22:40

Yeah, it was. It was it was very interesting. I don't know, I thought it came to a conclusive ending, um, which you don't get from the first one, which is what I wanted in the first one. So everything, like I said, I'll reiterate everything that I wanted in the first one, I got in the second one exponentially, but I got it.

SPEAKER_06 22:58

Okay, well, let's see if uh the rest of you are pleased with what you got. Now take a moment, soak in your thoughts, consider your ratings. Before we actually score this movie, Alexis, we know there's more death, but exactly how many bodies were in this movie?

SPEAKER_04 23:13

I'm not sure of the hacker math on this, but yes, there was a very uh uh big difference between, you know, the 74 version and this one. We have 18 deaths in this movie, guys.

SPEAKER_03 23:27

That's high.

SPEAKER_04 23:27

Yeah, I mean, really? It seems plausible. It seems high for one house full of people. Seems excessive, quite frankly.

SPEAKER_03 23:35

Were there 18 people in this movie?

unknown 23:38

No.

SPEAKER_04 23:39

Some people died twice, don't you know?

SPEAKER_02 23:43

Even though they looked kind of the same, apparently, there was 18 people in this movie.

SPEAKER_06 23:46

Yeah. Now, as we know, one of the stars of the original 1974 Black Christmas was the good boy, Claude. Damn it, Claude, look what you made me do. But Ryan, was there a Claude in this movie, or what is our animal report?

SPEAKER_07 23:58

There is no Claude. Our animal report is is so fresh and clean that you literally can't even see it. It's see-through, it doesn't exist.

SPEAKER_03 24:05

In a world without animals.

SPEAKER_06 24:06

Well, there are a lot of feelings to be had about this movie, at least none of them are about a dog being murdered in a car. Now, let's go ahead and get into our ratings. Black X from 2006. X is for X-rated. Was it a hack or slash?

SPEAKER_02 24:21

It's a hack for me, dog. Remakes and reboots can be great. The operative word being can. This is a case of a bad remake, as most horror remakes of this decade were. So I'm not surprised by it because I honestly think that era in film was not good. But yeah, characters I didn't really care about. Honestly, I couldn't figure out kind of who was who. Um You know, the grittiness of the of the mid-2000s was evident in this film as well. They definitely made some choices in in this movie, you know, things were done, decisions were made, and unfortunately, the test of time is not past. And uh yeah, it's a hack.

SPEAKER_04 25:02

I'll get this out of the way. I'm watching this movie based on what it was. I wasn't it like I had my expectations, but clearly I found out that I needed to put those aside. And this might be something, you know, when we do our, you know, 2020 Rewind, this might be a movie that I take away the slash from. Um, I don't know. It was just a fun movie to watch. It's not something that I'm gonna take seriously. Um, Star Set of Cass, Harriet the Spy was in it. We have Gretchen Wieners in here.

SPEAKER_05 25:35

Yes, Gretchen Wieners.

SPEAKER_04 25:36

We have so many people, like, and I'm obsessed, you know? And I like it. I I'm just taking for what it was. I got more than I wanted to. Um, I didn't need all the backstory. I didn't even need any of it, I don't think. I think I needed like a third, the first third. I don't know. It was just very top C trovy movie. Everything was going everywhere. And I think I had a week um since I'd watched this because I watched it a little bit. Um so I was removed from it a little bit and I wasn't, I was like, it wasn't that bad. Catch me probably that night, I would have said something different, but I didn't think it was that bad. I think it's worth a watch.

SPEAKER_06 26:12

Operative word being that bad.

SPEAKER_07 26:17

I think it's worth a watch. This is like one of those things where when you hack a movie, I'm gonna look back on this and be like, but you slashed Black Christmas 2006.

SPEAKER_04 26:27

Let it be, let it be.

SPEAKER_07 26:29

It'll always be what it be. Yeah, it's gonna live with me forever. Yeah, this is uh this is a hack, guys. There's a reason our lovely Chris continuously brings this movie up. Um, I feel like it completely went the wrong way with what we wanted from the original. Obviously, I'm speaking for myself, but I think we wanted some story and like some building upon the first one. And what they gave us was this like insanity that just went down these roads that it did need to go down. And there's a point where I fully didn't understand what was happening. Like, there are so many characters in this movie that like I think Mac, you kind of mentioned it. Like, there are people that just seem like the same, or there's someone that was someone's mother, and I didn't even know it was their mother. And then I was like, wait, why are they doing that if that's their mother? And and and it just things, things went way too far out of control. And um, it there wasn't a redeeming quality for me. There was one character that I kind of enjoyed in this movie, I think it a little bit, and most of the time she was drunk and asleep. So I mean, like, it is what it is. Um, I I just I I think Chris has many times said like there's basically no redeeming quality to this movie, and I I kind of have to agree.

SPEAKER_03 27:45

Yeah, Chris and I bonded over the fact that there's no redeeming qualities about this movie. Um, I remembered uh this movie from 2006. I the things I remember most were one of the kills, and then a lot of the choices from the ending, and I remember them being very what the fuck. They didn't make any damn bit of sense. Uh, and watching it this time, pretty much feel the same. Uh, but I was surprised because I, like Alexis, didn't think it was that bad. I actually had a lot of fun. Um, truly every single kill is solid.

SPEAKER_07 28:17

What's happening?

SPEAKER_03 28:18

The gore is great.

SPEAKER_07 28:20

Don't do this.

SPEAKER_03 28:21

The girls in it, love them. Gretchen Wieners, Michelle Trachtenberg, Andrea Martin, with probably one of the most iconic deaths in horror movie history for me. Uh, this is something I remember and I have ingrained in my brain since 2006. Ultimately, the backstory, we got it. I'm not mad about it. I kind of like a lot of it. Uh, there's some choices that I'm like, no, that's so stupid, so over the top, so outrageous. But ultimately, I was entertained, I had fun, and this is a slash.

SPEAKER_06 28:51

That is the most disappointing slash you've ever given on this show, sir.

SPEAKER_03 28:54

I know. I really thought I was gonna hack this. I was like, oh yeah, I remember this movie being bullshit.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

I mean, I'm happy you guys had a good time. Like, that's important in life.

SPEAKER_06 29:03

Yeah, yeah, for sure. However, liking most things about the backstory we get, I think when you mathematically break down the backstory, to say that you like the vast majority makes me concerned about what you liked about the backstory.

SPEAKER_03 29:15

Uh, not that part.

SPEAKER_06 29:16

Yeah, uh there's still plenty to dislike, sir.

SPEAKER_03 29:20

I just have two words skin cookies.

SPEAKER_06 29:23

That was one of the worst parts.

SPEAKER_02 29:25

The backstory honestly felt like Florida Man. Like when I was watching it, it just felt like a Florida trailer to me.

SPEAKER_06 29:31

Yeah. Oh boy. Okay, well, I can't wait to get to that backstory. Obviously, everyone sees this coming, but I need to be perfectly clear on where I stand on this movie. Uh, because I did want to give it another shot. We all know how I feel about Rob Zombie's Halloween and my intense hate for it, right? Like, that's just ugh. So I thought like, you know what? I should I should go into this, give it a fair shot. Our patron Spencer pointed out, like, the house is gorgeous on the outside, feels a lot like Christmas. The movie's not not pretty in some in some ways, in some spaces. But ultimately, this movie is absurdly frustrating to me on many levels. It had the chance to take everything that was incredible about the original and elevate it, or just focus on the essence of it, but it botched it and attempts to give little nods to the original in this movie, except it misses the point. It fundamentally lacks the soul of Black Christmas. This is the shitty product of studio interference. And I want to just read you this quote from Glenn Morgan, who's the director of this film, from when he was asked whether or not he was happy with the results. Now I am redacting one line from this quote to avoid spoilers for our friends who haven't seen this. No way, and it's schizophrenic because Bob Weinstein came in and urinated on it. Really, there was a time where torture porn was the hot thing. You know, I became friends with Bob Clark. You can throw that movie into one of your first questions. I loved that movie. And also Christmas story, and I learned a lot from Bob and had his blessing that we were trying to make a version that he didn't get to deal with, the background of the killers and stuff like that. He then goes on to describe Bob Weinstein intervening and wanting to get specific death and handled it a specific way, and he continues with it was humiliating, it was horrible. I stayed to try and protect the casting crew, friends of mine, and I ended up taking it on the chin. This man's career ended after this movie, by the way, because of how it flopped. And I think Glenn says it best, but I'll just leave you with this, and I hope you understand the gravity of the situation for this movie. If I'm going to these lengths to describe my scoring, the 2006 Black Christmas remake is a hack. And it is undoubtedly the most unsatisfying remake I've ever seen. And yes, as of right now, it even ranks lower than Rob Zombie's Halloween. There I said it fucking hurts my soul to say it, but it's out there. I'm so happy that you're here to share that with us, Chris.

SPEAKER_03 31:50

Listen, I agree that this movie is both dumb and bad, but I had fun.

SPEAKER_06 31:55

Exactly. Is that's where I'm coming from. I you know what? I love Black Christmas too much to even entertain the idea of having fun with this nonsense.

SPEAKER_07 32:03

I don't love Black Christmas at all so far. And I still didn't have fun, none of them. So, whatever that means.

SPEAKER_02 32:11

It reminds me of Kevin Smith talking about when he was gonna make uh Superman lives and then Studio Interference ruined it. Like, oh, we want Superman to wear an all-black suit. We want there to be a giant mechanical spider that he has to fight. It's a great story, honestly. Should you should look it up on YouTube, but ultimately, I I don't know if it's the producer or whoever he was talking to, went and then made you know a film that had the features he was looking for with the giant mechanical spider in Wild Wild West. So yeah, studio interference is a real thing and it's real bad.

SPEAKER_06 32:44

Yeah. See, and here's the thing, right? I'm not one to really drag many movies through the mud, and I'm very, very forgiving about a lot of things. And I know that there are a lot of people out there that like this movie, a lot of people who look back and say, Oh, it's not that bad. If mathematically I could just like keep a score of all the terrible things about this movie, it is overwhelmingly bad for me. But with that, Black Exmus from 2006 has earned three hacks and two sloshes to wind down our very last movie of 2020. What a way to go. Skin cookies and all.

SPEAKER_03 33:18

Oops.

SPEAKER_06 33:19

You can find this movie in a few different places, but give it a watch, steal in your thoughts, and then join us in the second half so we can break it down. See you in a bit.

SPEAKER_01 33:37

Does your belly have too much bilirubin? Is your baby as yellow as an Ohio cornfield? Take two Begondas and call me in the morning. John, this is a thing of the past, thanks to this amazing new supplement. Avoid a lifelong obsession with skin cookies and sorority sister stalking with just two pills a day. Look like you're full of piss? Take this Begondice.

SPEAKER_06 34:06

Alright, welcome back. You are now entering the spoiler zone for Black Christmas from 2006. Now, obviously, there are 18 deaths in this movie, and if there's one thing we can all agree on, uh despite its varying levels of quality overall as a film, the gore was intense. So, Alexis, what's our gore score?

SPEAKER_04 34:23

Yeah, this is really intense. Uh, super high in my opinion. Um, there's a lot going on, a lot of cannibalism, you know. There's there it's it's it's definitely there, and I appreciate it because that's what I wanted in the first um in the 74 version, and I freaking got it. And Chris, I know you and Mac were talking about, you know, this uh studio interference, and it kind of transfers over into the gore too. Um, Melissa's original death was Agnes placing a bag over her head and ripping out her eye and dragging her down the hall by her eye socket as she's screaming helplessly. So Dimension Films uh reportedly forced Glenn Morgan to film this scene. Morgan decided to reshoot her death, as a previous one wasn't creative enough, um, to escaping the bag and being chased into her room and having part of her head sliced off by the ice skate, which is what you currently see in this movie um as well. This was uh film behind the studio's back, the eye socket and being pulled. That's what you see in the UK version, but clearly in the US version, you see the ice skate, which is kind of lame in my opinion. But um I get it, I get I don't know the mushy head, like that's one of the only good things about the movie. Yeah, but I I don't know. The the iconic scene of the bag, I just think of how menacing it seemed in the first one that it just to me didn't live up to like this like hype. But they did it every time.

SPEAKER_06 35:49

Okay, so they did it ice twice.

SPEAKER_03 35:50

Did it wait several times more than twice?

SPEAKER_06 35:52

Yeah, they overused it and did it badly.

SPEAKER_03 35:55

Okay, but hear me out. A year or two before this came out, Michelle Trachtenberg was in a movie called Ice Princess, where she was an ice skater. So for her to be killed with the ice skate was just very satisfying to me.

SPEAKER_06 36:09

Oh, good, good. A great moment. And when pressed for compliments, I have only that one and a couple others.

SPEAKER_03 36:16

So we'll keep pressing.

SPEAKER_04 36:17

We will keep pressing. Um, I know Paris had mentioned these skin cookies, which I absolutely loved. You know, you see these like creepy things, and you're just like, how the heck? Um, well, uh bacon was used as a garnish uh while they were uh making these Christmas cookies. Um, the when you see in the cannibal cookie scene, which I thought was really interesting.

SPEAKER_03 36:38

Wow.

SPEAKER_06 36:38

Okay, look, skin cookies, I get it. Filleting the back, bacon in the oven, whatever. Did not need to see the close-up of Billy eating literally fucking anything at all.

SPEAKER_04 36:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:50

Discours.

SPEAKER_04 36:52

Yeah, it was it was kind of creepy. It was kind of creepy. I think he looked just oddly. You think that's fine. He would have been had I not seen him yellow. He would have gotten daddy vibes in this one, but not with his I could see that maybe. He is a daddy, literally. He's a daddy, he's his sister's daddy.

SPEAKER_03 37:13

But honestly, during the during the skin cookie scene, for some reason I thought of like a young Alexis with her easy bake oven.

SPEAKER_04 37:21

I did have one. Those are my favorite things to do. I should have made it like that.

SPEAKER_07 37:25

Yeah, you definitely shouldn't, or you'd be in jail. There's a reason.

SPEAKER_04 37:30

Mom, I need some uh help with this. Come here and bring the knife. Mom, you got me scabs. Wow. I cut off my sister's hair and used it.

SPEAKER_06 37:40

You have a pound of flesh you don't need, right? I have to prepare myself for Hannibal Lecter.

SPEAKER_04 37:45

So um, I hate to steal Paris Asunder because he was talking about how how iconic this scene is. But to me, it's very iconic um in its own sense because I lived in Ohio. But um, Miss Mrs. Max's death uh with the falling icicle that impales her, that's like I love it. I just remember going outside of my house as a kid and just seeing them all. And I really was like, hmm, I wonder these could kill you. Or honestly, I was more worried about my dogs who like peed on the side of the house instead of because you know, dogs aren't walking very far in like three feet of snow. Uh, this is also as a reference from the movie Christmas story where the lead character is worn by his mother, you know, those icicles have been known to kill people, which is an accurate, an accurate depiction, and actually really does happen and does kill people. So I like that for that kill for many reasons.

SPEAKER_06 38:39

You know, the if the skull and the tissue is soft enough, it can definitely happen. I gotta say, Miss Miss Max death was my favorite, only because at least she didn't go out to shitty Billy Eragnus.

SPEAKER_02 38:51

Stole my favorite, went out on her own terms. You you just robbed me, Chris. That was also my favorite.

SPEAKER_04 38:56

Wow, I thought of 18 deaths. I picked the one that wasn't even killed by the killers, and y'all picked the same one. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 39:03

It's so good. It's Final Destination quality.

SPEAKER_06 39:05

Yeah, it is. With a lot of Final Destination actresses in this movie, too. I would just like to know.

SPEAKER_07 39:10

I I actually hardly remember that even happening.

SPEAKER_03 39:13

It was quick and it was like a two for one.

SPEAKER_07 39:15

My favorite kill was Billy on the Christmas tree because it meant this was finally over.

SPEAKER_06 39:23

Nice little punctuation at the end, uh.

SPEAKER_07 39:25

Yes, it didn't, it was not one of those ones that was like, uh, is he gonna die though? It was like, no, he's dead. It's over.

SPEAKER_06 39:31

Poor Billy got violated one last time.

SPEAKER_02 39:34

Oh yeah. Organs coming all out of the body.

SPEAKER_06 39:37

I gotta tell you though, least favorite. And this is, I think, what set the tone, and I was so blind and naive in 2006. The beginning death, Claire. First off, they just dispatched her so quickly, and it's like, oh, I don't like this. But okay, this must mean here's your here's your old. We're just gonna give you straight up new, but then they just keep fucking interjecting old, and then it gets weird. It was this unceremonious dispatch of the first kill, which is one of the most iconic kills from the original, and it's a total fake out. And I hate it because then they don't even fake it out well. They don't have her like creep up and be lured to the closet. It's just this, oh, I go back, oh, you remember how the camera lingered and uh we just saw that pen there, and now oop, it's not there. I'm feeling around, it's not there. Oh shit, we already saw someone under the bed. It just felt fucking underwhelming. And I was like, God, why why do you have to ruin it this way?

SPEAKER_07 40:37

Yeah, I totally agree. And um one of my least favorite things was the and I've already said this a little bit, but the number of eyeballs that we saw. Like, why did every character have to have their eyeballs ripped out and like eaten? And it just it did nothing for me. I've I've never felt so and let me be clear, I'm a person that has an issue with like eyeballs. Like, like I'm I'm cool with a lot of guts and gore and all that type of stuff, but have you ever seen somebody get LASIK surgery? Have you ever watched a video? It's horrific. That doesn't it that doesn't bother me, but like knives by your eyes, you know, I don't know, eyeballs are weird, but um it this movie didn't even didn't even hit on my phobia, my my thing that bothers me. It was just a lot of plastic eyeballs.

SPEAKER_03 41:24

I thought the eyeballs looked pretty good. But you know, we've talked about Andrew Martin's icicle kill, we talked about Michelle Trachtenberg's ice skating kill. Uh, I'm gonna give a little runner-up and a shout out to Gretchen Wiener's being killed with a garden claw, uh, because that was very satisfying to me as well.

SPEAKER_07 41:39

It was so low effort, it was so unsatisfying to me.

SPEAKER_06 41:41

Yeah. Okay, but here's the thing, right? Earlier in the movie, she talks about I want to bury the hatchet with my sister, and then it like zooms in underneath her dramatically as she pauses in her head. And it's like, okay, I see what you're trying to do with the dialogue, right? Because she also gets something buried in her fucking head, but mishandled in the foreshadowing and then underwhelming at at the end, which sucks because I love that actress. And I don't disagree with the idea of the kill Paris because it's something that could have been really, really cool. It was just the unceremonious, like, dunk. It's just underwhelming.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

I want to bury the hatchet in her head on this black Christmas. That's how it felt.

SPEAKER_07 42:18

Do you know that later, later, there will be something in her head?

SPEAKER_06 42:22

Also, I I love her and I've seen her in many different things, but now watching this again, I could only see Meg from Family Guy. It's all I could see.

SPEAKER_03 42:31

That's awesome. Oh, true. But only the first season. That's a deep cut.

SPEAKER_06 42:34

Real deep cut.

SPEAKER_03 42:35

She will live and die as Gretchen Wieners.

SPEAKER_06 42:38

I will say, as much as uh I adore her, she didn't win extra points in this movie for me. Lacey was present in what I think was one of my favorite scenes. And it's a stretch to even call it a favorite scene. Because really, I just have a couple moments that I really like. Love, Lauren, shit talking Christmas, when she's drunk on the couch. And before that, her being endearing and acknowledging Kelly was probably an only child. And then later on, Mrs. Mack talking shit when Heather didn't know what a snowbrush was. Three little vignettes.

SPEAKER_03 43:08

That was hilarious. I forgot about that part.

SPEAKER_02 43:10

My favorite in this in this film, it's a weird reason, but the gift giving scene, I think, was an improvement. Only because the girls gave Mrs. Mack a much better gift this time.

SPEAKER_03 43:19

The sexy negligee.

SPEAKER_02 43:20

Yeah. Like big improvement over the weird gown they gave her in the in the original.

SPEAKER_07 43:24

Okay, but when she said, Does it also come with a man to wear it for? That was great.

SPEAKER_03 43:29

Andrea Martin needed more comedy moments in this. That's something they didn't tap into enough, I think.

SPEAKER_02 43:35

She could have worn it for 2006 me, just saying.

SPEAKER_06 43:37

Okay. Okay. Okay. That's a direction.

SPEAKER_03 43:41

Listen, she would rock that. I think we can all agree. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 43:44

I don't want to know about 2006 Mac. I like 2020 Mac.

SPEAKER_02 43:48

I was in the middle of my college years. Well, no, I was in the beginning of my seven year stint at failing out of college. Um, but I was fit and um, like, you know, like act Like athletically fit and fairly attractive and pretty popular with the ladies. So it was a bad time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 44:05

Oh, yeah. Cause you're like 18 when you go to college.

SPEAKER_07 44:07

The freeze and pretty popular with the ladies. Really?

SPEAKER_06 44:11

We like to show that photo, you know. Andrea Martin could, in fact, have worn this for him, and it would have been age appropriate.

SPEAKER_03 44:16

Yes. I was still an adult at the time. I gotta say, for me, my favorite scene is really all of the flashbacks. I felt like Billy's mom as a character was so deranged, and all of the things that made Billy what he was made sense, you know? Uh, I got nothing in the first one as to who the fuck is Billy and why. And then, yeah, we definitely get too much. The jaundice, way overboard, ridiculously like highlighter yellow over the top. But ultimately, like the abuse, uh, the crazy shit that he went through as a child, like being trapped in like a crawl space in the attic. Um, I enjoyed the flashbacks, specifically because of the mom. She was kind of a really interesting character, except obviously the part where she had sex with her son. That that was not my favorite. That was very weird.

SPEAKER_07 45:10

She was trash for no reason. Also, clearly was just cool with her son being in the attic as as a in existence.

SPEAKER_03 45:19

Right, she was insane and horrible, but that's what makes a Billy. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_06 45:24

It was so bad. It was an excessive assembly of how many layers tall can we make this shit sandwich? Like, that's what it was. Like, give him give him a weird mom, right? Like, because you know, that's the core of Norman Bates, right? One of the most iconic killers. His mother, even though they had what is conceivably a more positive relationship than Billy and his mother, is a a different kind of abuse. You can go in the abusive background route, sure, but the layers of complexity there, like it is um, not only was he an unwanted child, he was a jaundice child. And not only was he a jaundice child, he was a favored child by the man she hated and wanted to murder. Not only that, he witnessed the murder. Not only that, he he was banished to the addict, not only that, her boyfriend couldn't get it up, and so she had to get her fixed with her own son. Not only that, he followed her her baby, and then he decided to take action. And oh my god, it was just so fucking much.

SPEAKER_03 46:24

It was so much, it was a lot, but some of it I liked.

SPEAKER_07 46:28

I also really need to say two small things. One, babies have jaundice quite frequently, and I had it. Not a reason to hate your child, okay?

SPEAKER_03 46:36

Yeah. That woman was not well.

SPEAKER_07 46:39

My cousin, I have a cousin. They used to have to sit him in front of the window so we could just chill in some sunlight a little bit. Because babies just be jaundice sometimes, bro. They were just created, they just became a thing nine months ago.

SPEAKER_02 46:50

I don't think that's why she hated him. I think she hated him because he reminded her of her husband.

SPEAKER_07 46:54

They made a point.

SPEAKER_02 46:55

Also, he had severe jaundice.

SPEAKER_07 46:58

Not only did she hate him. He was radioactive, but he was a jaundice baby. He was imperfect. And also, listen, I know I don't have a favorite scene for this movie. I do, however, want to bring up, since we're talking about the backstory, why did the dates not at all line up with the original movie? If we're going based on the original story, and there's like a guy that like lived in this house, why do the dates not add up at all? It doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_02 47:21

Well, it wasn't supposed to be the original story.

SPEAKER_07 47:24

I understand it's not like necessarily supposed to be the original story, but it's clearly building from the original. And so to go out of your way to give all of this dates when it could have just been like some time ago, and then after that, it was like 1970, 1973, September 1st. Like, why? Why is that a thing? Sorry.

SPEAKER_02 47:44

Well, so story-wise, the first movie's completely separate from this. The spree that he goes on is like killing his own family.

SPEAKER_07 47:49

I understand that it's separate.

SPEAKER_02 47:51

Right.

SPEAKER_07 47:51

It's clearly intended to make a call back to it in a way, not to be a sequel, but in a way, it's just annoying. They didn't have to.

SPEAKER_06 48:00

Yeah. Like they're trying to give background to a killer. They chose specific dates within the 70s, probably to make him a certain age to father his own sister. However, it's all gray is what it is. And I don't think we needed nearly even half of it. I don't think we needed it. This movie and Rob Zombie's Halloween both prove that too much backstory is a bad thing.

SPEAKER_02 48:23

The other faceless killer that we get, like Michael Myers, you get some backstory, but you don't get too much. Maybe in other films, maybe in later installments. But even then, like if you go back to the first couple of films with Michael Myers, they get to be, you know, this faceless killer that you don't feel like you know, like when their dad was taking a crap when they were seven or something. And but this this movie has to go that far and be like at age eight, his father went into the restroom and took a poop. And it's just like we don't come on, like we don't have to go that far.

SPEAKER_06 48:56

The thing they gave background to was the dialogue from the original movie, right? So what your mother and I must know is, and then it's what her his fucking mother's boyfriend, Billy, what your mother and I must know is it's like you're you're not gonna say that in these circumstances. So you picked weird circumstances to bring up this dialogue and it falls flat. And then additionally, that first phone call, you guys know I am very much a stickler for when remakes botch quotes that are great in the original.

SPEAKER_03 49:29

Yeah, what was the quote test this time?

SPEAKER_06 49:31

I'm going to kill you. It was the first phone call, the first phone call that comes 20 minutes into this movie. In the original, it's all obscenity, and then Barb talks back and says some shit to him, and then he just goes silent for the briefest second and says, I'm going to kill you. And this time it's just talking, talking, talking, I'm going to kill you. It's fucking weird.

SPEAKER_03 49:55

See, Chris, that was a really good impression for me of the original. Because that's what I heard with those phone calls. None of the calls were great in either of these movies.

SPEAKER_07 50:04

Yeah, exactly. You're not wrong.

SPEAKER_02 50:07

You know what else wasn't super great? Was the look of the movie, honestly not my favorite because of the era that it's made in. Feels like other CW-inspired movies of this decade. I think I had a hard time finding something super amazing. Obviously, it's an improvement. It's been a long time since the 70s, so it does look a bit cleaner, but it still looks just that false grittiness. But the audio was a huge upgrade for me. So not the not the actual yeah, not the actual look of it, but at least I could hear it this time.

SPEAKER_04 50:38

I got more Christmas vibes from this movie. I the reds really stuck out, like the colors were really vibrant in this movie. Um visually, like I I just love this um idea of Billy crawling down this wall and Agnes um kind of crawling up the crawling up the wall. And to me, that's terrifying. And I just like the way they they pulled that off. And I just like the look of that scene. It was it honestly, if there was anything terrifying about this movie, that would put me in the position where I would be terrified.

SPEAKER_07 51:08

That is true. I do agree. Even when he did it when he was young, when he crawled up there the first time, it was super creepy. Like just the way he crawled up there. Did they borrow the boy from this? Yeah, I know. It's so many boy vibes.

SPEAKER_03 51:21

Yeah, being inside the walls like that is spooky, especially when there's two people coming at you from above and below. But for me, my favorite visual has to go to our really completely unnecessary throwaway character Eve. Uh, her decapitated head in the snow. Like that was just a beautiful frame. Um, I I would print that out and put it on my wall. That's a weird one to frame.

SPEAKER_06 51:46

Uh again, when when pressed for a compliment for this movie, I will do I will say they did wonders technically with their lighting. Uh, mostly the Christmas lights. Lots of Christmas lights, very pretty. We did enjoy that.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

But also her name was Eve, like Christmas Eve.

SPEAKER_06 52:01

Oh, yes, yes. Christmas is murdered. Black Christmas is murdered, quite frankly. But when houses lose power in movies, but it still looks good on the inside, I'm a big fan of that. Uh, also just remembering one of the best things is when the house does lose power and they're in front of the laptop, and the laptop old school screensaver because it's disconnected from its power supply comes back away to alert you'd some battery power, and she sees the sex tape, although the sex tape angle was completely unnecessary and irrelevant to the movie.

SPEAKER_07 52:34

Yes, and I didn't even understand which people were in the sex tape. Yeah, I thought it was like a girl with a professor, and then this guy shows up, and then they keep like looking at the he keeps looking at the computer, and I'm like, I don't understand what that is. It clearly doesn't look anything like you, and I don't know who she is, and I don't know who this chick is, because that's your girlfriend. I don't know who anybody is.

SPEAKER_06 52:52

It's a complicated love triangle because you know you can't have an early 2000s movie without having some kind of jealousy mixed in, or just it's as if like normal people don't record themselves having sex. I think that's a issue. Like the way that was handled, that dynamic when she found out it's like sometimes things happen to people and things get posted online against your will. Yeah. However, her attitude towards her was like, you're even the kind of guy who would have tapes, and it's like you don't know at this moment that it's not consensual since it's on Megan's computer in Megan's room and she was looking at it. You don't know that it wasn't consensual.

SPEAKER_07 53:28

She didn't even say, like, when is this from? You know, there was like nothing. She was like, Oh, I hate you. And I was just like, Well, I mean, you know, he was a person before he met you. You went zero to a hundred from loving him a second ago.

SPEAKER_03 53:41

Okay, but back then, sex tapes were like a huge scandal. I feel like there was a big taboo around that that's changed so much since then. Like, I remember there was a girl in our high school who, like, she was one of the more popular girls, and then this rumor got out that there was a videotape of her putting different things in different places, and then she was ruined from then on.

SPEAKER_07 54:02

Yes, but also uh you should treat people that you care about with respect enough to be like, tell me what happened here.

SPEAKER_03 54:09

Like Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_07 54:11

He didn't do anything.

SPEAKER_03 54:12

I feel like we weren't that evolved back then.

SPEAKER_07 54:14

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_06 54:16

Nah, this is still a weird ass reaction from someone you love.

SPEAKER_07 54:19

Yeah, I mean, you know, they're in college, it probably doesn't mean much. There's there's a there's a point to that, but still.

SPEAKER_06 54:24

Means enough when you're like, oh, it's our first Christmas together. We should be together. It's your first Christmas together, you should not be you're I'm your family now.

SPEAKER_00 54:32

Like Sir Yeah. Sir? I'm the cup that now. Look at me. They kept saying that one.

SPEAKER_06 54:38

Overall, with this movie, I do I do struggle, but again, I don't really like to spend many episodes just totally trashing a movie. The best part of this movie is Andrea Martin as Mrs. Mack because she's a gem. And apart from her, I think second best would be Crystal Lowe as Lauren, aka knockoff Barb. Uh, because even though there's no way she could even compare to Barb and Margot Kidder, uh, she was still a nice little comedic break from the rest of this movie.

SPEAKER_07 55:04

Yeah, she was the only one that didn't annoy me. Everyone else annoyed me, like, drove me insane. Everything they said, I was just like, why? Why are we doing this? All the like casual conversation, they're like, this is a this is a pagan holiday, and like just going on and on about stuff. I was like, okay, okay. She was the only relief.

SPEAKER_02 55:22

The best part for me was the way the movie handled not having the police involved. They could have gone the same way as the first movie where they involved them and there was some comedy or whatever it was, but they just omitted it and they did it in a way that made sense inside of the story, even though it didn't make sense in real life, which is fine. But I I think it added up inside the film itself, which is okay. Because if it didn't, if there was like, oh, we forgot to call the cops, then I would have been like, Come on, that's the first thing you're gonna do.

SPEAKER_07 55:48

Are you talking about the news clip where they were saying local calls will work, but you'll find your dissidence calls won't work.

SPEAKER_02 55:54

Like that and like trying to call in and they're overwhelmed with calls. Ah, yeah. Like that was see, that was that was a good way to just like write it out.

SPEAKER_06 56:01

They'll be here in two hours.

SPEAKER_02 56:03

Yeah, yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_06 56:04

You're in a queue right now, so I mean it it do be like that sometimes, to be fair. You're right. You have a good shout out to Michelle Trattenberg for recognizing the point to just call the police.

SPEAKER_02 56:14

Right. Smart, smart, smart first move. Gotta say that. But it's it's good the way they kind of just wrote it out real quick.

SPEAKER_03 56:20

I agree. Um, I forgot that there was not 30 minutes of call tracing in this movie, uh, and I appreciate that. Um, but things I didn't appreciate are pretty numerous in this movie. It wasn't great. Like I've said, it is dumb. A lot of the choices are bad. Choices like the whole sex tape storyline, including the dad from Scream Queens, his whole thing, you could have just deleted it and I would have been fine. Um, the mom having sex with Billy, no thank you. The overdone jaundice, um, and then really almost all of Agnes was very rough. You know, she didn't have Jaundice, and then all of a sudden she did, and also she's a man. Um, that was very bizarre to me in 2006, and even now I'm like, why was this character played by a man? Uh so those things are very much not good for me.

SPEAKER_06 57:08

And the weird thing is they thought they were like, oh, we want Agnes to be androgynous. But you you didn't find someone androgynous.

SPEAKER_03 57:17

Nope.

SPEAKER_07 57:17

Yeah, it's not androgynous at all.

SPEAKER_03 57:20

You put a man in a bad wig.

SPEAKER_07 57:21

Paris could have been a better Agnes. Paris could have been androgynous.

SPEAKER_06 57:25

Have you seen him as Hannah Montanable Lector? Of course I could have. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 57:30

Yeah, to go along with that, Paris. Um, Billy just, I mean, I didn't get any originality from his character at all. Like it was just, you know, the same sexually abused character that has this, you know, deformity that, you know, like, oh, wait, hold on. We're gonna sprinkle one more thing in. He's also a cannibal. Like it was just like stacking his care, like his characterization. And I was just like, okay, I get it. I I I I really get it. Um, so that was just like a pain point for me that also had to deal with his character as well.

SPEAKER_06 58:02

Oh my god, he's like a fucking choose your own adventure of horror movie characters.

SPEAKER_07 58:06

Yes, exactly. And also he didn't have like any significance on screen, everyone just talked about him. Like he didn't, I mean, he did a little at the end, but he basically did nothing. Like basically the whole movie was like, oh, but Billy's here, and then the whole story about Billy, but it wasn't Billy, it was Agnes, like the entire time. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 58:26

Also, he snug out in a fucking Santa suit, and some guy looked right at him and said, Oh, no, the John DeSanta, of course, is mixed protests.

SPEAKER_07 58:34

Yeah, so I just that was what I was just about to bring up is we're glossing over the beginning of this movie in the freaking in the prison where they're just the guy's just the prison guard just opens the door. Like, oh, this guy tries to escape every single Christmas. Let me open the door. It just seems like a good idea. Or just open the door. Open the door and look around.

SPEAKER_03 58:55

And they get stabbed by a candy cane.

SPEAKER_02 58:56

Yeah, how did they not know about the candy canes? You know that it can turn sharp because you eat them yourself and they always turn into weapons.

SPEAKER_07 59:03

He held the door away with a juice box.

SPEAKER_02 59:06

Wait, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_07 59:07

Paris, how do you eat candy canes? Yeah, do you just bite it? Do you bite candy canes? He doesn't suck it to a point.

SPEAKER_03 59:12

Are we are we accepting the fact that a candy cane could kill someone? Because I thought that was ridiculously unrealistic.

SPEAKER_04 59:18

That's totally have you haven't sucked it sharp enough, have you?

SPEAKER_03 59:22

That was so thin at the tip, though, it would have snapped.

SPEAKER_06 59:25

It did snap. You didn't hear the snap, it just penetrated enough and you probably hit the right spot.

SPEAKER_03 59:28

Oh my god. Okay, I thought that and then I also thought the icicle thing was completely impossible too, and that's what made it funny, but apparently that's real.

SPEAKER_06 59:35

Yeah, it's a plausible story if your tissue is soft enough.

SPEAKER_07 59:39

I watched it enough Mythbusters to know that if anything comes to you and hits you at the right velocity, you can die. So yeah, ridiculous jail scene. Ridiculous.

SPEAKER_02 59:49

But you remember the guard more than you remember the other characters in the film.

SPEAKER_07 59:52

No, I remember the nurse that that the the disgusting Santa is talking to. Uh yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 59:58

You remember these side characters from like the first 10 minutes of the film more than you remember all the sorority sisters.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:05

Absolutely. I don't even remember how many there were.

SPEAKER_06 1:00:08

Yeah, uh, several. And here's the other problem, right? The in the original you had sorority sisters who felt just like women who were just perfectly normal, had their own normal interactions. Uh, and here you have women who have probably some good relationships, but you reduced their characters down to like cattiness, and I have a problem with that. Where I have issues with Rob Zombie, and again, I don't have any issue with cursing, right? But an overuse of the word fuck in the Halloween 2007 version. This one had an overuse of the word bitch, and then you insert Kyle uh calling all the women bitches multiple times in degrading ways. Fuck all you bitches, spoiled ass bitches. It's like, yeah, this is a this movie's a product of its time, and it doesn't it wasn't good then, and it's not good now. They hollowed out the best thing about Black Christmas, it's feminism.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:02

Let's just say the 2000s weren't a great time for feminism.

SPEAKER_06 1:01:06

No, they were not. I agree, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:09

And that truly removes its watch value for me, let alone re-watch value. Because I think as a movie on its own, there's better places to go for entertainment, especially if you're looking for a movie like Black Christmas, because you could just watch Black Christmas. So it doesn't really add anything to that idea.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:29

I think as a standalone, I'd watch it again in a few years. I think I would. It was a fine, it was fine.

SPEAKER_06 1:01:37

You slashed it, so you probably will.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:39

I would like to say that I have spent this entire podcast trashing this movie, and I usually don't do that, and I don't feel regret about it, but I won't be re-watching it, of course.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:48

I thought you were gonna say you would. I was like, oh, that's a twist.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:51

No, no, no. I just wanted to I just kind of wanted to apologize for being so bad on this movie, but I I just gotta be what I be.

SPEAKER_06 1:01:59

Usually we don't exude levels of toxicity, and that's probably just led the charge by me tonight. But I just can't I have feelings about this movie that I can I cannot contain.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:07

Listen, sorry. I don't think Alexis Rye slashed this movie because it's fantastic. It's just fun, you know? And for me, this is actually if I had to pick one like holiday horror movie to watch, it would be this one. Um, which gives me a lot of hope for the newest iteration of Black Christmas because it seems like they're just getting better.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:26

Ah, let me know how that goes for you. Uh, I'm so excited. Ryan hacked it and I slashed it. It does something. It did, it's you should watch it. It did something, but I don't know. It does not repeat the same mistakes as this movie, for sure.

SPEAKER_07 1:02:39

Not the same, definitely different.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:40

Or the original.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:42

Or the original. Yep, different, completely definitely a different movie.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:45

Love it.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:46

For sure. Now, uh obviously all these movies are very different from each other, but let's see what fun facts Mac has dug up for fact or fiction.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:54

This was Lacey Shabert's first horror film. I'm gonna say fiction. I can see her being a horror girl in her younger years.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:02

I'm gonna say fact because I feel like this is her younger years. Fact.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:06

Yeah, this is fact. The other actors in the film were involved in horror before this, but Lacey not so much. Number two, Agnes is portrayed in the third act by cameraman Dean Friss, who would play the cello on filming breaks to entertain the crew. The cello.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:21

Fiction. I played cello. Cello is not that entertaining. Can you play cello? I can play the cello. I can play Ode to Joy. Oh wow. Right now, if you need me to. And a Viola.

SPEAKER_06 1:03:32

A Renaissance woman of many talents. Didn't say it'd be good.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:35

I'm thinking fact because this did look like a cameraman.

SPEAKER_06 1:03:38

Fact.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:39

It is a fact. Everything in there is a fact. He's a cameraman. Yeah. Um, so he was originally cast as Billy with no acting experience, uh, but he was recast as Agnes, and as all of you have mentioned, I'm not sure why.

SPEAKER_06 1:03:51

Yeah, carrying that good old Black Christmas tradition of you know making the camera operator the killer for some of the scenes.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:57

I'm down for that, especially when he has that like 80s hair band hairband hair. Hair band hair? Yeah. That's band hair.

SPEAKER_06 1:04:06

He had fried hair and he got fried too.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:08

So number three, while it was hard for me to keep up with all the characters in this film, imagine keeping up with all the stunt actors. Each actor had their own matching stunt actor.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:18

Fiction. Fiction. I feel like some of these chicks got hit.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:22

Fiction, because I feel like what stunts were there really?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:26

It is fiction. The actors portraying the Soroti sisters did all their own stunts.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:30

Yeah, not surprised.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:31

Number four. Amanda Seafried, the Karen from Mean Girls, auditioned for the role of Kelly, but wasn't chosen because of Lacey Shabert.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:39

Fiction. I'll go fact.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:41

I'm gonna say fact. It is a fact. Not because of drama, though. Because the filmmakers didn't want two actors from Mean Girls. I don't know why. On Wednesdays, we were pink.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:50

No, that makes so much sense.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:51

No, they didn't need to. Then it would be like spoofy mean girls. It's yeah, Mean Girls is too iconic.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:57

I would have actually loved if she was in it.

SPEAKER_06 1:04:59

I mean, it can't be worse. It's okay. She did get some action in Jennifer's body and was grid in it. So she's yeah, she's had her own thing going.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:07

Number five. The filmmakers originally planned to bring back the best character from the original, Claude the Cat. But unfortunately, they had to be without for a goodness due to Katie Cassidy's unfortunate allergy.

unknown 1:05:19

Fact.

SPEAKER_07 1:05:20

Fact, I guess. But also they don't care enough, I'm sure.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:22

Yeah, fiction. That woman in Candyman had a ridiculous bee allergy, and we saw what they did to her. She ate them.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:28

Yeah, the 2000s are a more sensitive time that's totally insensitive in all the wrong ways, though.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:33

Well, this was fiction, I made it up. Seriously, though, why did we not get more clawed?

SPEAKER_06 1:05:37

Because he's a little prick. Look what you made me do.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:40

Well, that's been fact or fiction.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:42

Oh, well, there we have it, folks. Black Christmas from 2006 has taken us out on quite the note here. We have three hacks and two slashes. Uh give this movie a watch. There's certainly a lot of feelings out there. Uh, if you do watch the Black Christmas I gave you my heart special over on our Patreon, I promise you uh it's a look at the franchise. But you won't have quite this passionate hate from me. I promise I'll be more respectful. There's a lot of ways you can reach out to us. We want to know what you think, so one of those ways starts with our website, hackerslash.com.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:10

And on our social media accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

SPEAKER_07 1:06:13

If you feel like there were way too many unicorn figurine kills in this movie, you can reach out to our Hacker Slash Hotline. You can leave us a voicemail at 757-606-0128, or visit hacker slash.com slash contact to send us an audio message, especially if you're not in America. Shout out to you.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:29

Or if you've been hit in the head by an icicle, you can send us an email to feedback at hackerslash.com.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:34

Ooh, ghost emails. Have you enjoyed listening to our podcast? Consider becoming one of our patrons. You can visit patreon.com slash hacker slash to earn cool perks for as low as one dollar a month. Perks like the Hacker Slash Rewind, where we talk about the original Black Christmas with our current cast.

SPEAKER_06 1:06:49

We'll see you next time. Bye, suckers.